NCAA Men's National Collegiate Volleyball Championship

Competition structure

Before the 2011–12 school year (2012 championship), men's volleyball did not have an official divisional structure; even now, that structure is truncated. The National Collegiate Championship remains as the NCAA's top-level championship, but Division III members now have their own championship, officially known as the NCAA Men's Division III Volleyball Championship.

With the introduction of an official Division III championship, schools in that division are no longer eligible for the National Collegiate Championship. The last exception was Rutgers–Newark, whose men's volleyball program had been a grandfathered scholarship program, and could compete for the National Collegiate Championship through 2014. Rutgers–Newark completed a transition to Division III men's volleyball at the end of that season, and joined the D-III Continental Volleyball Conference effective with the 2015 season.

There are three general regions for men's volleyball: "West", "Mid-West", and "East". The three major conferences that currently represent these regions are the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF), Midwestern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association (MIVA), and Eastern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association (EIVA). After the creation of the D-III national championship, the only other conference whose members are eligible to compete for the National Collegiate Championship is Conference Carolinas, a Division II league. Members of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), a separate athletics governing body whose members are primarily smaller institutions, regularly play matches against NCAA teams.

Because of the historic lack of an official divisional structure in men's volleyball, all three major conferences have members that normally compete in Division II. Before the creation of the Division III national championship, the EIVA had several Division III members, but all of those schools now compete in D-III men's volleyball.

Through the 2013 tournament, each of the three major conferences (MPSF, MIVA and EIVA) received an automatic bid to the Final Four, with one additional at-large bid. The remaining bid was an at-large bid that could be awarded to any team in Division I or II (including Rutgers–Newark). Generally, the best team not receiving an automatic bid (usually from one of the three major conferences) received the at-large bid.

Beginning with the 2014 championship, the field expanded to six teams, with the two new teams being the champion of Conference Carolinas and one extra at-large entry. The new format features two quarterfinal matches involving the four lowest-seeded teams in the field, with the winners joining the two top seeds in the semifinals. Originally, the quarterfinals were to be played at campus sites, with the Final Four at a separate predetermined site, but it was decided instead to have the entire championship tournament at one site.

Division I participation

The number of Division I schools sponsoring men's volleyball has fluctuated between 20 and 24 teams since 1986. None of the traditional D-I conferences sponsor volleyball. Two of the three major conferences, the Eastern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association (EIVA) and Midwestern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association (MIVA), are volleyball-specific conferences. The third major conference is the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF), a multi-sport conference of schools whose primary conferences do not sponsor its ten sports. In addition to the 22 D-I schools, 24 Division II schools are competing in D-I volleyball in the current 2017 men's volleyball season:

Division II does not have a separate national championship, and neither Division I nor II has a sufficient number of teams to sponsor a national championship without the other.

Following the 2017 season, the MPSF men's volleyball league will lose half of its 12 members when the Big West Conference adds the sport. The five full Big West members that field men's volleyball teams will be joined by UC San Diego. At the same time, the MPSF will add Concordia–Irvine from the independent ranks and Grand Canyon from the MIVA.

Champions

†Vacated due to NCAA violations

Past tournaments

Historically, California-based universities have dominated the men's volleyball national championship; Loyola Chicago, Penn State, Ohio State and BYU are the only non-California universities to have won the National Collegiate championship; Hawaii and Lewis also won the championship tournament, but had their victories vacated due to NCAA rules violations. Only seven non-California universities have participated in the National Collegiate championship match (Loyola, BYU, Penn State, Ohio State, IPFW, Hawaii, and Lewis), although other universities such as Princeton and Ball State have participated in the final four. Only three finals have involved two non-California schools: the 2003 final, when Lewis defeated BYU but had its win vacated; the 2015 final, in which Loyola defeated Lewis; and the 2016 final, when Ohio State defeated BYU.

UCLA, Southern California, Penn State, Stanford, and Long Beach State are the only schools in Division I to have won an NCAA national championship in both men and women's volleyball. (But for Hawaii's vacated 2002 title, it would have matched this feat with 3 NCAA and 1 AIAW women's national championships.) In addition, Stanford (1996–97) and Penn State (2007–08) are the only universities whose men and women's volleyball programs won the national championship in the same academic year. The 2016 championship tournament took place from May 3–7 at Rec Hall on the campus of Penn State.

2011

2012

2013

2014

2015